art, crafts and life

I’m a Bathonian – born and brought up in Bath – and I love living in this beautiful city with my husband Jim. We’ve got two wonderful grown up sons and have just become grandparents.

Me and Edgar

All my life I’ve loved anything creative, from making plasticine shoes for my dolls and stitching troll clothes to sell to my friends when I was a child, to embroidery, cake icing, knitting , drawing and painting as an adult. I feel incredibly lucky that for the past ten years I’ve been making money doing some of the things I love the best – designing and writing about cross stitch, and making cards, scrapbooks and other papercraft things for Future Publishing’s magazines. I’ve also had a book – One Hundred Great Ways to Make Cards – published by David & Charles, and have contributed to a cross stitch book – the Cross Stitcher’s Countdown to Christmas.

The other big thing in my life is the Townswomen’s Guild – I’ve been a Townswomen for 30 years – and through TG I’ve done so many things , including attending a Buckingham Palace Garden Party, travelling First Class on Eurostar to speak at a French packaging conference in Poitier, presenting flowers to Princess Anne and reading a lesson in York Minster, that I would never have done otherwise. And it was through being National ViceChairman in charge of sport and creative leisure that I took workshops in ceramic painting and scrapbooking for other Townswomen, and wrote for the Townswoman magazine, giving me the experience to get work with Future publishing.

At present I’m Chairman of Bath Federation of Townswomen’s Guilds, and running a new Guild in Bath that I started last year. I’m also Exhibition Organiser for the Combe Down Art Group, and Press and Publicity Officer for Articulate, a new art and crafts group in Bath, while also still working freelance as Technical Editor for PaperCraft Inspirations magazines. I take occassional workshops, do commissions, and exhibit my paintings in group exhibitions.